Thursday 2 August 2007

The Games People Play

I love it when Chich and I exchange banter and epiphanies! During our idle random chitchats and experiences, something usually comes up that begs for further investigation. Sometimes, certain situations don't even need to be further looked into, because divine intervention kicks in, and brings the answer to us. This my friends, is one of those situations!

Let me rant a bit about what I'm getting at. You see, there are two types of self help books out there that cater to the relationship/dating world. The first kind targets Women. This book is thought to be a must in every woman's library. It will claim to contain all the solutions to problems that haven't even taken place yet, providing hope for the weary, and justification for the bitter. Books like "He's just not that into you", (which I will admit, put a lot of things into perspective) act as bibles... a code of conduct for women to live by. Women all over the world see books like this as eye openers, as they contain truths and "in your face" opinions, that we always wanted to hear but were afraid to admit. These books have undoubtedly made women more aware of the other sex, and what may go through their heads. This is usually because the author of the book is a man, who claims that his goal is to essentially make things easier for the scorned or love sick woman, who doesn't know any better. These are all good things. However, I am just making this note for comparison's sake.

The second kind of book out there, targets Men. This books serves a different purpose than the ones that cater to women. These books don't focus on ridding men of complexes and anxieties that are caused by women. In fact, these books serve quite the opposite purpose. They act as guidelines for single (and not so single) men, who view the dating/relationship world as a big playground, for them to play on. Now, this doesn't necessarly mean ALL men... but specifically the ones who go out to bars or social situations and attempt to pick up women. Women usually unaware of the game, fall for these guys, get hurt in the process of the Game and come home to books like "He's just not that into you" to justify what happened a couple of hours ago.

Chich referred me to a book titled, "The Game" by Neil Strauss. This book focuses on the strange world of the "pickup artist" who prowls the single social scene, in an effort to master this game. The reason this is so important to mention is because Chich and I were targets of a page from this book, a couple of weeks ago. Mind you, at the moment the guy who copied this page into real time, actually succeeded. He had Chich and myself feeding right out of the palm of his hand. We were plesantly surprised at his pick up line and add on, as it was fresh, exciting and quite entertaining. This was refreshing from the usual drool that we were used to at these bars. Sure it seemed odd at first, but we had to give the guy credit. He was being pretty unique.

Not Really. Flash forward 3 weeks to today.

Page 154 was it?

Word for word....
Right from the scenario that caused him to come and talk to us in the first place, down to the "best friend test". It was all there, in print.... poor Chich had to read it on the subway on the way to work.... with no room for genuine reaction. And read it she did.... 5 times over. As I heard her read the page to me over the phone, I was dumbstruck! Really, we got bamboozled. While us women go out there hoping to get WHATEVER out of the night, there are men who knowingly come up to women and consciously do this. They know women are reading these self help books, and are putty in their hands. Their self help books are created to contradict everything we learn about in our own self help books! Amazing!
Here is a link outlining The Game. It truly is an insightful book and a good read. It's getting great reviews.
http://www.canongate.net/The-Game/Hardback

To Matt from Gracies:
If you're going to take advice from a book, please at least make a small attempt at changing the Best Friend test from "do you share the same shampoo" to "do you share the same conditioner"... It's one word.... not that hard! If you had used half the time you spent memorizing the page, into actually presenting yourself honestly, you may have had a different outcome. It's one thing to take advice from a book in helping your Game.... but at least put your own spin on it rather than plagiarize! Because chances are, the person you're playing with will have read the book too.... and then it's GAME OVER ... for you.

That is all... for now.

-SC

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